Month: October 2004

The somewhat fanciful theory that 9/11 blasted a hole in the space-time continuum and propelled us all into an inverted alternate universe – Bizarro World – where up is down, right is left, and the President of the United States is the most uninformed person on earth, was only supposed to be a joke on … Continue reading “Bizarro Bush”

Seven months after the horrific pogrom that raged across the occupied Serbian province of Kosovo, the occupiers are poised to lead its perpetrators a step close to their coveted ultimate prize. Elections scheduled for Oct. 23 were designed to establish the Albanian authorities as a legitimate "government" of the province, bolstering their separatist claims just … Continue reading “Tragedy and Farce”

With the presidential election coming down to the wire, the possibility of a revived military draft is looming as a potentially decisive factor in the outcome. While President George W. Bush and his fellow Republicans vehemently reject any suggestion that a draft, which was eliminated by former President Richard Nixon during the last years of … Continue reading “Fear of Draft Affecting Election”

While the Bush administration expresses frustration that its motivations in the "war on terrorism" are questioned throughout the Islamic world, it has a similar problem with Muslims at home, according to a major survey [.pdf] of nearly 2,000 followers of Islam across the United States. A plurality of 38 percent of Muslims in the United … Continue reading “Muslim-American Support for ‘War on Terror’ Plummets”

Amid growing reports of violence in Haiti‘s capital Port-au-Prince, the United States announced Tuesday it will consider requests to sell weapons to the country’s interim government on a case-by-case basis, signaling the end to a 13-year arms embargo. The decision, confirmed by the State Department, appears designed to begin supplying weapons to the 2,500-man police … Continue reading “US Lifts Haitian Arms Embargo as Tensions Mount”

A month ago I wrote a dispatch, "Incident on Haifa Street," considering news reports about a bloody set of encounters in downtown Baghdad, only a few hundred yards from the heavily fortified, American-occupied Green Zone. A day or two later, I visited the TomDispatch mail box and found an e-mail that began, “hi tom, i … Continue reading “A GI’s Mother Looks at Iraq”

JERUSALEM – Israel has been gripped by disengagement fever since the opening of the winter session of Parliament, the Knesset, last week. In a few days lawmakers will have to vote on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s proposal to withdraw the army from the Gaza Strip and dismantle all settlements there, as well as four in … Continue reading “Disengagement Turns Israeli Politics Upside Down”

Antiwar Arguments for WarGood, well-reasoned article but no mention of our relationship to Israel as a major cause of anti-Americanism in the Middle East!~ Tim McCormickAnthony Gregory replies:Thanks for the kind words. I don’t think the Israel factor needs to be mentioned in every article. It is important, and is appropriately mentioned frequently on Antiwar.com. … Continue reading “Backtalk, September 21, 2004”

French political scientist Pierre Rosanvallon was not describing the Bush administration when he wrote, “[They] speak like Tocqueville but continue to think like Robespierre.” Had he been referring to the Bushies rather than to France’s elites, he might have said that they speak like Tocqueville but act like Robespierre. Rosanvallon argues that France’s big cheeses … Continue reading “Kerry’s Cowardly Convergence”

Ron Suskind, former Wall Street Journal reporter and author of The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O’Neill, has a piece in last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine that is the talk of the internet, and with good reason: it is a devastating portrait of this "faith-based" … Continue reading “Delusions of Empire”